KOAI (95.1 FM) is a

commercial Commercial may refer to: * a dose of advertising conveyed through media (such as - for example - radio or television) ** Radio advertisement ** Television advertisement * (adjective for:) commerce, a system of voluntary exchange of products and s ...

radio station Radio broadcasting is transmission of audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestrial radio broadcasting the radio waves are broadcast by a land-based radio ...

licensed A license (or licence) is an official permission or permit to do, use, or own something (as well as the document of that permission or permit). A license is granted by a party (licensor) to another party (licensee) as an element of an agreeme ...

Sun City West, Arizona Sun City West is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in Maricopa County, Arizona, United States. The population was 25,806 at the 2020 census. Geography Sun City West is located northwest of downtown Phoenix at (33 ...

, and serving the

Phoenix metropolitan area The Phoenix Metropolitan Area – also the Valley of the Sun, the Salt River Valley, or Metro Phoenix (known by most locals simply as “the Valley”) – is the largest metropolitan area in the Southwestern United States, centered on the city ...

. The station is owned by Riviera Broadcasting, an

subsidiary A subsidiary, subsidiary company or daughter company is a company owned or controlled by another company, which is called the parent company or holding company. Two or more subsidiaries that either belong to the same parent company or having a s ...

of the

Yucaipa Companies The Yucaipa Companies, LLC is an American private equity firm founded in 1986 by Ronald Burkle. It specializes in private equity and venture capital, with a focus on middle-market companies, growth capital, industry consolidation, leveraged buy ...

. It broadcasts an

oldies Oldies is a term for musical genres such as pop music, rock and roll, doo-wop, surf music (broadly characterized as classic rock and pop rock) from the second half of the 20th century, specifically from around the mid-1950s to the 1980s, as we ...

and

classic hits Classic hits is a radio format which generally includes songs from the top 40 music charts from the late 1960s to the early 2000s, with music from the 1980s serving as the core of the format. Music that was popularized by MTV in the early 1980s ...

radio format A radio format or programming format (not to be confused with broadcast programming) describes the overall content broadcast on a radio station. The radio format emerged mainly in the United States in the 1950s, at a time when Radio broadcasting, ...

, featuring mostly hits from the 1960s, 70s and 80s. It primarily competes with

Audacy Audacy, previously known as Radio.com, is a free broadcast and Internet radio platform owned by the namesake company Audacy, Inc. (formerly known as Entercom). The Audacy platform functions as a music recommender system and is the national umbr ...

-owned 94.5

KOOL-FM KOOL-FM (94.5 MHz) is a commercial classic hits radio station in Phoenix, Arizona. The station is owned by Audacy, Inc. The station is branded as Big 94.5 and features mostly hits of the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, and is one of the top-performing ...

, which concentrates on 1980s hits, with some 70s and 90s titles. KOAI has an

effective radiated power Effective radiated power (ERP), synonymous with equivalent radiated power, is an IEEE standardized definition of directional radio frequency (RF) power, such as that emitted by a radio transmitter. It is the total power in watts that would hav ...

(ERP) of 41,000

watt The watt (symbol: W) is the unit of power or radiant flux in the International System of Units (SI), equal to 1 joule per second or 1 kg⋅m2⋅s−3. It is used to quantify the rate of energy transfer. The watt is named after James Wa ...

s. The

transmitter In electronics and telecommunications, a radio transmitter or just transmitter is an electronic device which produces radio waves with an antenna (radio), antenna. The transmitter itself generates a radio frequency alternating current, which i ...

is in

Crown King, Arizona Crown King is an unincorporated community in Yavapai County, Arizona, United States, located at an elevation of 5,771 feet (1,759 m). Crown King has a ZIP Code of 86343; in 2000, the population of the 86343 ZCTA was 133. The site of a ...

, about 50 miles northwest of Phoenix, giving KOAI a rimshot signal in the metro area. Programming is also heard on 250-watt

FM translator A broadcast relay station, also known as a satellite station, relay transmitter, broadcast translator (U.S.), re-broadcaster (Canada), repeater (two-way radio) or complementary station (Mexico), is a broadcast transmitter which repeats (or tran ...

94.9 K235CB in

Chandler Chandler or The Chandler may refer to: * Chandler (occupation), originally head of the medieval household office responsible for candles, now a person who makes or sells candles * Ship chandler, a dealer in supplies or equipment for ships Arts ...

. The translator is fed by 103.9

KZON KZON (103.9 FM) is a commercial radio station licensed to Gilbert, Arizona, and broadcasting to the Phoenix metropolitan area. KZON airs a Rhythmic Hot AC radio format branded as "Hot 97.5/103.9" (simulcasting with KMVA 97.5 FM Dewey-Humboldt ...

- HD2. The

studio A studio is an artist or worker's workroom. This can be for the purpose of acting, architecture, painting, pottery (ceramics), sculpture, origami, woodworking, scrapbooking, photography, graphic design, filmmaking, animation, industrial design ...

s and offices are on 7th Street in

Midtown Phoenix The Central Avenue Corridor is a significant stretch of north–south Central Avenue in Phoenix, Arizona. Roughly bounded by Camelback Road to its north, and McDowell Road to its south, this is one of Phoenix's most vital and heavily trafficked s ...

History

95.1 went on the air in 1996, licensed to

Winslow Winslow may refer to: Places United Kingdom * Winslow, Buckinghamshire, England, a market town and civil parish * Winslow Rural District, Buckinghamshire, a rural district from 1894 to 1974 United States and Canada * Rural Municipality of Winslo ...

, broadcasting from Mingus Mountain and covering areas of Northern Arizona. It was owned by Ted Tucker's Desert West Air Ranchers Corporation. Tucker moved the station in 2000 to the Crown King site (along with a change of city of license to Mayer, later changed again to Sun City West). It was sold in 2004 to Sun City Communications for $18.7 million. The new ownership flipped KFMR from a simulcast of Tucker's

KCDX KCDX (103.1 FM) is a radio station broadcasting from Globe, Arizona to the east of Phoenix since March 2002 with a commercial-free rock music format. The station is licensed to Florence, Arizona. The KCDX listening area is primarily the eastern h ...

to the Hispanic rhythmic ("hurban") format as KVIB "The Vibe". As The Vibe, KVIB played a youth-oriented radio format playing both Spanish-language and English-language pop. The station's mix of music targeted the Valley's burgeoning young Latino population, particularly long-time residents who can speak English but prefer Spanish. On January 23, 2014, KVIB changed its format to

Spanish language Spanish ( or , Castilian) is a Romance languages, Romance language of the Indo-European language family that evolved from colloquial Latin spoken on the Iberian peninsula. Today, it is a world language, global language with more than 500 millio ...

adult contemporary Adult contemporary music (AC) is a form of radio-played popular music, ranging from 1960s vocal and 1970s soft rock music to predominantly ballad-heavy music of the present day, with varying degrees of easy listening, pop, soul, R&B, quie ...

, branded as "Solamente Éxitos" with a bilingual presentation. On August 13, 2014, at noon, 95.1 flipped to

Soft Adult Contemporary Adult contemporary music (AC) is a form of radio-played popular music, ranging from 1960s vocal and 1970s soft rock music to predominantly ballad-heavy music of the present day, with varying degrees of easy listening, pop, soul, R&B, quiet sto ...

as ''95.1 The Oasis'', and nine days later, the station changed its

call sign In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign (also known as a call name or call letters—and historically as a call signal—or abbreviated as a call) is a unique identifier for a transmitter station. A call sign can be formally assigne ...

to KOAI. The last song of the Spanish AC format was " Royals" by

Lorde Ella Marija Lani Yelich-O'Connor (born 7 November 1996), known professionally as Lorde ( ), is a New Zealand singer-songwriter. Taking inspiration from aristocracy for her stage name, she is known for her unconventional musical styles and i ...

with the first song on The Oasis being '' Cool Change'' by the

Little River Band Little River Band (LRB) are a rock band originally formed in Melbourne, Australia, in March 1975. The band achieved commercial success in both Australia and the United States. They have sold more than 30 million records; six studio albums rea ...

. The station played a

Christmas music Christmas music comprises a variety of genres of music regularly performed or heard around the Christmas season. Music associated with Christmas may be purely instrumental, or, in the case of carols or songs, may employ lyrics whose subject ma ...

format for the 2014 holiday season, the second station in Phoenix after

KESZ KESZ (99.9 FM) is a commercial radio station licensed to Phoenix, Arizona, featuring an adult contemporary format known as "99.9 KEZ". Owned and operated by iHeartMedia the station serves the Phoenix metropolitan area. KESZ's studios are locate ...

. On April 9, 2015, 95.1 gained an FM translator, K235CB 94.9 on South Mountain, (licensed to

), and also began simulcasting on the HD2

digital subchannel In broadcasting, digital subchannels are a method of transmitting more than one independent program stream simultaneously from the same digital radio or television station on the same radio frequency channel. This is done by using data compress ...

of KEXX. In May 2015, KOAI adjusted its

playlist A playlist is a list of video or audio files that can be played back on a media player either sequentially or in a shuffled order. In its most general form, an audio playlist is simply a list of songs, but sometimes a loop. The term has sever ...

to include more uptempo selections from the 1990s through the present time, while still retaining a gold/soft AC-lean. On June 5, 2015, while it was still a soft AC station, KOAI picked up

Delilah Delilah ( ; , meaning "delicate";Gesenius's ''Hebrew-Chaldee Lexicon'' ar, دليلة, Dalīlah; grc, label=Greek, Δαλιδά, Dalidá) is a woman mentioned in the sixteenth chapter of the Book of Judges in the Hebrew Bible. She is loved b ...

's syndicated evening radio show. Delilah continued on the station through two additional format changes, first to a mainstream

station, and then to

. Delilah was discontinued on August 25, 2017, with evenings featuring more music. On September 30, 2019, at 5PM, after playing " Addicted to Love" by Robert Palmer, KOAI changed its format from classic hits to a new format concept for

baby boomers Baby boomers, often shortened to boomers, are the Western demographic cohort following the Silent Generation and preceding Generation X. The generation is often defined as people born from 1946 to 1964, during the mid-20th century baby boom. Th ...

developed by veteran radio programmer John Sebastian. It originally blended pop, rock, soul, and country from a seven-decade span and branded as "The Wow Factor". The first song on The Wow Factor was "

Ride My See-Saw __NOTOC__ "Ride My See-Saw" is a 1968 single by the English progressive rock band the Moody Blues. It was written by the band's bassist John Lodge, and was first released on the Moody Blues' 1968 album '' In Search of the Lost Chord''. It was the ...

" by

The Moody Blues The Moody Blues were an English rock band formed in Birmingham in 1964, initially consisting of keyboardist Mike Pinder, multi-instrumentalist Ray Thomas, guitarist Denny Laine, drummer Graeme Edge and bassist Clint Warwick. The group came to ...

.First Listen: KOAI (The Wow Factor) Phoenix
Radioinsight – October 2, 2019

References

External links

The Wow Factor website
* * {{Phoenix Radio OAI